On a problem by Nathan Jacobson (Q2157361)

The classical Wedderburn coordinatization theorem says that if a unital associative algebra \(A\) contains a matrix algebra \(M_n(F)\) with the same identity element, then it is itself a matrix algebra, \( A \cong M_n(D)\), ``coordinated'' by \(D\). Generalizations and analogs of this theorem were proved for various classes of algebras and superalgebras. The common content of all these results is that if an algebra (or superalgebra) contains a certain subalgebra (matrix algebra, octonions, Albert algebra) with the same identity element, then the algebra itself has the same structure, but not over the basic field rather over a certain algebra that ``coordinatizes'' it. In the present paper, the authors proved a coordinatization theorem for unital alternative algebras containing \(2 \times 2\) matrix algebra with the same identity element. Let \(B\) be an associative unital algebra and let \(V\) be a left \(B\)-module such that \([B,B]\) annihilates \(V.\) Clearly, in this case \(V\) has a structure of a commutative \(B\)-bimodule with \(v \cdot b = b \cdot v,\) \(v \in V, b \in B.\) Assume that there exists a \(B\)-bilinear skew-symmetric mapping \(\langle, \rangle: V \times V \to B\) such that \(\langle V,V \rangle \subseteq Z(B)\) and formula \[ \langle u,v \rangle w+ \langle v,w \rangle u +\langle w, u\rangle v =0 \] holds for any \(u, v, w \in V.\) Let \(A= M_2(B) \oplus V^2,\) where \(V^2 = \{(u, v) | u, v \in V \} \cong V \oplus V.\) Let \(X=X_a +(x, y),\) \(Y=Y_a +(z, t),\) where \(X_a, Y_a \in M_2(B)\) and \((x, y), (z, t) \in V^2.\) Define a product in \(A\) by the formula: \[ XY = X_aY_a + \left( \begin{array}{cc} -\langle x,t \rangle & - \langle y,t \rangle \\ \langle x,z \rangle & \langle y,z \rangle \end{array}\right) +(z, t) X_a + (x, y) Y_a^*, \] where \(\left( \begin{array}{cc} a & b \\ c & d \end{array}\right)^*=\left( \begin{array}{cc} d & -b \\ -c & a \end{array}\right).\) The main result of the paper is given in the following theorem. Theorem 5.1. The algebra \(A\) with the product defined above is an alternative unital algebra containing \(M_2(F)\) with the same unit. Conversely, every unital alternative algebra that contains the matrix algebra \(M_2(F)\) with the same unit has this form.